Avatar
became the highest
grossing film ever when it hit theaters last year. The film drew
huge crowds and while it lined the coffers of 20th Century Fox and
the wallet of James Cameron, the movie drew lots of interest to 3D in
theaters and homes. Even though the film garnered lots of fans, it
also had a few critics including
the U.S. Marine Corps.

20th Century Fox has announced that
Avatar is the best
selling movie in America on both Blu-ray and DVD. The film
is also the best selling Blu-ray movie of all time with 2.7 million
copies sold in only four days on store shelves in North America
alone. The previous record was 2.5 million units.

In
all, Avatar
has sold 6.5 million copies (DVD + Blu-ray) since it launched on Thursday of last
week. The downside to the popularity of Avatar
on
Blu-ray is that some buyers of the movie are finding that the Blu-ray
disc won’t play on some players on the market.

The specific
player cited
in reports is the Samsung BD-UP5000. The reason the player
reportedly can’t play Avatar
is because of a firmware update that is missing and needed by the
device. Other Samsung Blu-ray players are also facing the same issue.
Presumably, Samsung will be rushing the update out for the players
since the Avatar
is so popular.

Some
users are claiming that it's not a firmware issue, but some sort of
DRM issue with the movie itself pointing the finger at 20th Century
Fox rather than Samsung.

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See, Reclaimer, its people like you that will never "get it", your so caught up with things being "real", having political meaning, or just being too deep.

Thats the whole point of a movie, a summer movie, like Avatar is: ITS JUST FOR FUN. The movie itself doesn't take itself too seriously, at all. THATS WHY it uses such a generic storyline.

The effects look "cartoony". I'm sorry, but i thought they opted for a more "artistic" look. Lets take a look at two movies, both of which have some of the best CGI in a movie thus far:

District 9. Great job here PJ, the damn scenes look damn near real...BUT, notice that the colors are drab...colorless...one can say 'lifeless'...hey maybe that was the GOAL of PJ...the aliens were malnourished, almost lifeless, as are the machines...plus, it was shot in a very run down area....notice thats his THEME, but it does look 'real'

Now look at Avatar. It takes place in a JUNGLE, which is quite the opposite setting than a run down city: ITS FULL OF LIFE, and unless your a moron, most jungles are chalk full of color...now add the sci-fi element...if you were to ever be in real jungle, you would be very surprised at the amount of color, right down to its animals and flora...

Two different movies with two different themes, done perfectly as "realistic" as possible...

Avatar is not meant to be taken serious...its not meant to win Acting Academy Awards...its meant as a fun flick and in that respects, it trumps District 9.

You also have to remember, Avatar came out, when really, no action movie was really out to compete against, nothing on its scale.

And really thats the point of action/adventure type movies: to entertain..some movies entertain you in a deep type of way such as The Davinci Code, Indiana Jones as a quick example of excellent plots and great dialogue.

But then there are just movies that entertain our senses and our sense of just being "awestruck", for example like Star Wars, when it first came out with its grand visual effects, or a movie like..just pick an Arnold or Stallone film for just balls out action...the acting is horrible but most people knew that going in, they went for the pure action

Avatar is in the middle, where it had its money on its visual effects, and just enough dialogue/acting to keep, apparently over 2 billion entertained...

I'm glad companies are embracing CGI, im tired of all the current critics hating on the heavy use of it. I believe a lot of movies could have benefited from the use of MORE CGI, aka the Xmen Series, the AVP series...to name a few...

quote: Thats the whole point of a movie, a summer movie , like Avatar is:

Uhh it wasn't a summer movie. It was released in the winter. But I digress.

quote: most jungles are chalk full of color

Colors. Ones besides green and blue.

You know what, never mind. You are just way too into the whole apologize for Avatar mindset for me. And make no mistake, you ARE apologizing and trying to explain away it's faults as being " what it is ".

quote: You also have to remember, Avatar came out, when really, no action movie was really out to compete against, nothing on its scale.

Uhh yeah because it was released in the winter. But you just said "summer" movie. Do you know what the hell you're talking about ?

EVERY movie has its faults, even Braveheart, and trust me, that is my favorite movie.

I'm not trying apologize for anything, i'm just letting YOU know, you take movies WAY to seriously. I'm trying to let you know, your putting Avatar in the wrong category, it seems you want to put Avatar to movies with deep plots and a lot of character depth, but Avatar has none of that.

Avatar is all about its visuals, of which it has some of the, if not the best visuals of any movie to date. Period.

But, it has just enough plot/depth to keep most people, just entertained enough to keep watching, hell just read some of the comments here, most think the movie is "meh" but kept them entertained.

I don't think Avatar is the greatest thing since sliced bread, but , i can walk away and say 'hey, it was an alright movie', and is definitely gonna be THE new BR showpiece title for most BR owners. And thats what this movie is all about.

But hey, we are all different, if you didn't dig it, just say you didn't dig it, but you can't knock down faults that arent there.

The movie itself doesn't take itself too seriously, why should you? <---you know what i mean here? some movies take themselves too seriously

And you have to give credit where its due: namely its CG, although, since i am a gamer, i have seen much better "artistic styles" than in Avatar, Final Fantasy still has better "styled" floating islands lol

Avatar was almost entirely CG, and photo-realistic, from the blades of grass to the mountain peaks (as real as flaoting mountains can be, I guess). District 9's effects were laughable at best and only composed a small percentage of the total shots. Seriously, that looked like a bad Havok demo. Blade Runner...? LOL Blade Runner is one of my all-time favorites, but certainly not because of its effects.

I'll concede that the only part about Avatar that looked like a cartoon were the Disney-ized faces, but even those looked more realistic than either movie you mentioned. Do people seriously believe that Avatar doesn't have the best CG of any movie released? It's like the Crysis of movies! Anyway, if you don't agree, then there's not much I can tell ya.

quote: Epic fail. That, in of itself, is NOT a justification for paying to watch a movie. You have got to be a teenage kid. No doubt about it.

Says you, apparently. Is is perfect justification in my book. I'm in my 30s, thank you very much. My dad enjoyed it and he's almost 70. Not sure where this baseless hate is coming from, but it's just a movie, dude.

The prequels had mostly half-assed CG, even for their time, but I was still entertained despite the massive plot holes, wooden performances, and the eternal void that Lucas peddled as a written script. I will buy them when they inevitably come out on Blu-Ray. I don't need my movies or my videogames to have epic story-telling or excessive character development. It's refreshing when they do, but the day I start taking media so seriously that I can't enjoy mindless entertainment... well, let's just say that I won't. I'll leave that up to folks like you.

I dont need ALL of my movies to be full of deep plots and character developments, just needs to be fun"

My bad on the summer movie thing, big whoop, you guys are not idiots, you know what i meant by calling it a summer movie, its just there to be a fun, movie. Avatar brought a breath of fresh air, as we could agree, there wasn't much out there when it released

"Again, missing the point. I don't care about the CGI ! Nobody does. It's a medium to tell a story, it shouldn't BE the entire story."

Some movies are about the medium, there have been countless movies that totally rely on its special effects some more so than others. Granted some movies do it better than others , Bladerunner <----but Bladerunner flopped at the box office, it didn't have the impact it did until it hit home, just as a fyi. BUT, i think Avatar is a case of overhype: people like yourself went into this movie with these huge expectations, i guess because of the $$ spent on the CG ( more on this later ) whereas i came in thinking it was gonna be exactly what i thought it was: A "tech" demo, as Fox/Cameron were both hyping the visuals, with a decent enough story to garner a very broad audience, and it couldn't have been done any other way.

Look, heres the conundrum: People always are quick to hang Hollywood for it's lack of creativity, YET, when an original movie comes out, usually it's met with pretty harsh reviews from critics like yourself, which makes studios NOT want to take risks with original content...blame yourselves..

Avatar is a good example of a "half" risk: the risk is in its full use of CG as the medium and the half is the broad plot...

District 9 cheaper than Avatar..true, but do you even know why Reclaimer that is so? I hope you do, but in case you don't, remember, Peter Jackson HAS HIS OWN CG studio, the costs to bring that studio up was more than likely covered with the LotR Trilogy and King Kong...THATS WHY District 9 was cheap...

I came late to this conversation, but if you didn't go see the movie, then this whole argument is moot.

Now, to throw in my two cents. People often times wonder things like why is Final Fantasy VII so loved, why do so many people buy the iphone, why was star wars so loved, why do so many people buy the japanese cars (minus recent issues, but honda, toyata, and to a lesser extent nissan). And now avatar.

Reason is because they usually do a lot of things right, and not a lot of things wrong. For example, was the ipod the first mp3 player, no but they sure did a lot of good things from ease of use to marketing so that it didn't even need to be the best, but good enough, easy to use good marketing = money. same with iphone, I had the nokia n95 at that time and now I have the n900 but even though it is cheaper in the long run, it has already been proven that the general populace will not put up 550 or 600 or 700 bucks up front for a phone. iphone was easy to use. At the time had like the largest screen by far on a readily accessible phone, could be used as an ipod and had great marketing. same issues with cars, or street fighter success vs. Virtua Fighter (i love that game) failures, and so forth. Which brings me to movies.

The cheap indie film that is boring as hell, but maybe had some good "technical" acting doesn't sell. People don't give a SH#$ about technical acting. Star Wars had some poor acting, the prequals were even worse, but that didn't stop Star Wars from being a mega hit, and it's two sequals continuing it. Which then prompted the eventual sequals.

The Hurt Locker won best picture, some people said it wasn't an accurate description of what happens in IRAQ, that include military people, but it still won. But it didn't make money, ask someone in the streets, and I bet 75% of them won't even know what it is, they probably can't even tell you it won. Others like the English Patient, which won as well, i tried to watch and it was BORING as HELL, that was when I was a teenager, who knows now, if I might change, but that was 12 years ago and it was a snore fest.

Which brings me to the most important point. THE NUMBER ONE ROLL OF A MOVIE, or game for that matter, is to entertain you, and to entertain as many a you as possible. If a movie has good acting but wasn't entertaining then it sucks, plain and simple.

People say Avatar was all hype, No it wasn't, it opened up to just 78 million dollars in the US. That is good, but there are a boat load of movies that opened up to much higher results. The differences is that Avatar had a huge word of mouth afterwards, and thus it only dropped to 75 the next week, then a bit less the following week and so forth. Instead of openning to 115 then dropping to 60s like others, only to be in the teens by week 4.

Finally, People often times give disney, pixars, dreamworks movies a free pass. Was UP's visuals better, was the acting and writing better??? What about the cliche's was Kung Fu Panda, or Nemo, or Incredibles somehow original movies. It is 2010 now, for the most part, EVERY MOVIE you see will have themes of movies prior. It is how it is implemented and how entertaining it is that really matters, and Avatar has proven via 2.8 billion dollars that it is pretty damn entertaining.

If you don't think so, then your in the minority, there has never been a movie that was 100% liked, and there never will be.

Look, man, it's clear you're just a hater, plain and simple. You admit you haven't seen the movie which means that your opinion about said movie is irrelevant. You have formed your opinion based solely upon the sensationalized reports in the media.

Avatar carries a stigma because its technological aspects completely overshadow its seen-before, tried-and-true plot. Also, because of some overly sensitive folks that don't pay attention to said plot, they believe it has some sort of anti-military Iraq message. The plot really isn't bad, though it is predictable and a bit silly. Cameron made his hypocritical bias known to the world years ago (and it saturates this entire movie), but it has not affected his ability to make an effectively entertaining movie that is well worth the price of admission... at least once.

I haven't read "War and Peace", but I know it's a landmark novel. I haven't seen Avatar, but I'm intimately familiar with the story, plot background, and how the visuals are used to tell the story.

quote: You have formed your opinion based solely upon the sensationalized reports in the media.

That makes no sense. The "Media" sensation of Avatar has all been overwhelmingly positive. Where are you coming from with this ??

quote: The plot really isn't bad, though it is predictable and a bit silly.

That's putting it mildly. The plot is simple tripe, for simple minded people. No offense, but if you enjoyed Avatar you simply aren't a big thinker. Because anyone who is would HAVE to be offended by how the movie insults your intelligence and attempts to pull your heartstrings at every turn.

I just have a hard time getting past how manipulative and simple the story is. The Na'vi are way too peaceful and harmonious for a primitive culture. And the military was way too simplistic and destructive for an advanced culture. It's a comical stereotype, a crewcut wearing racist white man. After 200 years and human evolution and the development of space travel, the military is apparently still stuck in the 18'th Century mindset in terms of cultural understanding. For one, it's kind of insulting to the military today given the obvious allegory driving the message of the movie. And two, it's a little too easy and convenient. There's no middle ground. And the ultimate irony is that with all the time and money spent making this a 3D movie, the story and characters are stuck in one dimension.

quote: That makes no sense. The "Media" sensation of Avatar has all been overwhelmingly positive.

I was referring to the negative media that link the movie to real-world events and culture.

I'm fully aware of Cameron's pessimistic views of humanity and how they are portrayed and displayed in this movie, but you're really reaching with your views (especially since you haven't even seen the movie). To put it simply, if this movie was supposed to be a factual documentary on the Iraq war or the story of Pocahontas, then it would be worth the time and effort to defame it and argue its agenda. However, this is a purely fictional story that borrows, like ALL fiction, from stories we have heard before.

In the name of fun, I will make a few counterpoints.

quote: The Na'vi are way too peaceful and harmonious for a primitive culture.

We are given a window into really only one tribe of Na'vi. Outside of a miraculous unifying force, we really don't know how they normally interact with other tribes. We know that the Na'vi have weapons and nothing in the movie implies that they never fight one another. All that we do know is that this particular tribe is under assault.

quote: The Military was way too simplistic and destructive for an advanced culture

The "military" forces depicted were not part of any recognized military force, but rather mercenaries. The movie itself describes them as mercenaries, in it only for action and money, not for honor.

quote: crewcut wearing racist white man

He was the primary antagonist, but there were many other skin colors represented. It was a "diverse" group of mercs.

quote: After 200 years and human evolution...

Hey man, I'd like to be optimistic about the future, but if history has shown us anything, it's that technology and "evolution" are no guarantees of decreased brutality or increased understanding.

quote: ...story and characters are stuck in one dimension.

LOL I've heard that one many times before. Are you a Red Letter Media fan? haha This isn't a B-movie, it's got some excellent performances - even if they are cliched, they are cliched very well.

My advice: give it a rent (on Blu-Ray, if possible) and relax. You might actually enjoy it if you stop trying to glean meaning from it.